I swear there is a face on the top part of the vertical bush. I see evil eyes watching me...
Sunday, July 14, 2013 - 12:22
Dialog:
Item gained/lost dialog
Decision based dialog
Menus (similar to decision based dialog)
Inventory, items, and misc related:
Inventory (structure, logic, management GUI)
Equiped items
Keyring
Quest items
Sprites and graphics:
Character sprite generation logic
Transition effects (fade in/out, etc.)
Preloader screen (cannot finish until near the end)
Stats system and effects on stats:
Character stats (intelligence, strength, dexterity, etc.)
Equipment values, graphics, etc
Leveling system for gaining stats
Buffs and negative effects (to include visual effects)
Currency system
Please tell me if there's anything else I should add to this list, modify, or change in some way. Also, tell me what would be most useful to work on next.
Most definitely I'm looking at adding dialog options! The first and easiest thought was a simple yes/no prompt. I want to make a full-blown menu dialog at some point, just haven't tackled it yet. The split dialog used for gaining or losing items is still a bit buggy, I haven't finished working out the details of that yet. For some reason it doesn't want to move the text for the item to the right coordinates but I'll hammer that out in short order.
I'm learning AS3 as I go. If I'm making crazy/weird/non-sense mistakes or reinventing the wheel or doing something totally out of the norm I'm happy to hear about it. AS3 is by no means my first language. I understand writing software, just not all the intricate details of how AS3 works. I've played with Tweens a bit and plan to use them for transitions and cut scenes but for complicated stuff (like shaking the screen for an earthquake) I just couldn't use them.
There's a simple array for the hero's inventory with no way to manage it. I chose an array over a vector because I don't want to do all the extra gear work of making a generic item base class and extending everything else off of it, it's less prone to break and more simple that way. I will probably change my mind about that and write a base class but that'll be decided later. The eventual goal is to have an inventory screen with currently worn gear, a keyring managed separately from main inventory, and a space for quest items separate from inventory. I want to make a GUI inventory manager with icons that are drag-drop capable, very similar to Diablo II but all items would take up 1 slot. I like the idea of 32x32 pixel icons for inventory items.
Something to Note
I've never seen RPG-Maker or any other game-making software. I'm making things based on my experience with playing games. If there's a feature or function you would expect but don't see I'm happy to take suggestions. I have a short to-do list of features to work out with no particular order. Maybe I should formally write-out that list and post it here so everyone can see it and leave comments.
Had a little bit of time on my hands so I decided to put some more stuff into my engine and game demo. I think I've settled on a solid-ish API for now but still haven't put together a real inventory. I'll post the source on my site in a zip file for anyone curious to see what it looks like so far. I can't promise it'll look nice or even make sense but I try to leave comments and I try to make things meaningful. I'm open to hear all suggestions, comments, etc.
I decided I didn't like how dialogs were displayed and didn't like how I setup event handling to work with them initially. Changed it so the engine can queue up several dialogs to display, one after the next, and added the ability to display an image to the left or the right of the text in the dialog messages. Check it out, they have conversations now!
@cemkalyoncu I've been looking at how to do A* path finding in flash for a couple months. It doesn't look so complicated but never having done it means I have no idea. I'd like to make that part of this game engine at some point. For now I think I need to finish implementing NPCs and enemies first.
I'm using Adobe CS 5.5 Flash to build my FLA file and associated AS3 files. If you want I can email what I have made so far to you when I get back to Germany. I'm happy to share with anyone else who's experienced and has some idea what the internals should look like.
@cjc83486 Some nice graphics you linked. I looked through them a little bit. Have to look more when I get back.
Happy 4th of July. I won't have much chance to work on game stuff this weekend because I'll be in Amsterdam, plus it was my anniversary on Tuesday. I did make a good start on NPCs (non-player characters) but there's still a bit left before they're done and troubleshot/tested. Have a good weekend!
I'm not picky about particular formats. I prefer an image file (PNG, GIF, JPEG, TIFF). I'll take whatever mapeditor uses too (http://www.mapeditor.org/). PDF works as long as it's color and reasonable quality. I have the Adobe CS 5.5 master suite so if someone makes some crazy cool awesome sauce map in Illustrator or Photoshop I can deal with those formats with no problem (just make sure it's compatible with CS 5.5). If you have a friend who wants to make a map using HTML, CSS, and Javascript I'll be fine with looking at that in a browser. I don't really care as long as it's viewable with normal software. I have a virtual machine that runs Ubuntu linux so I can open GIMP formats but I prefer not to do that because it's extra work for me to conver to a flat image format that I can use.
If you want to make an ASCII level in notepad with a legend telling what characters represent what tiles in what LPC files I'd probably be willing to try to use that too. Just don't get too crazy or use weird formats and we'll be okay. I prefer flat image formats that are common industry standard. Whatever makes a small file size that's easy to see detail is prefered so it can be emailed.
Things I Need:
MAPS! (world/town/area maps)
Design considerations (placement of houses, buildings, people, etc.)
Some reasonable detail about an area so a map can be generated
There are some things I'd like to get related to characters. These can come before, during, or after the maps. Stuff I need about characters:
Hero description (I'll pick something random as a placeholder if open)
Non-Player Characters (NPCs) to include physical description, gender, significant visual traits
Significant characters (potential party members, enemies, etc.) and their visual traits
Thing you can do to speed-up the character creation process:
Pick some sprites from LPC-compatible asset
Take naked sprites and overlaying the appropriate gear and features
Give me links to the different assets that should be on a sprite and I'll lay them all together to make a finished spritesheet
You can sift through my favorites for ideas. I went through and picked out a bunch of the LPC-compatible assets on OGA in preparation for making this game. I've also asked Sharm to make some graphic assets for us at a small cost to myself to personalize this game and any future games I make using my engine.
I swear there is a face on the top part of the vertical bush. I see evil eyes watching me...
Dialog:
Inventory, items, and misc related:
Sprites and graphics:
Stats system and effects on stats:
Please tell me if there's anything else I should add to this list, modify, or change in some way. Also, tell me what would be most useful to work on next.
Most definitely I'm looking at adding dialog options! The first and easiest thought was a simple yes/no prompt. I want to make a full-blown menu dialog at some point, just haven't tackled it yet. The split dialog used for gaining or losing items is still a bit buggy, I haven't finished working out the details of that yet. For some reason it doesn't want to move the text for the item to the right coordinates but I'll hammer that out in short order.
I'm learning AS3 as I go. If I'm making crazy/weird/non-sense mistakes or reinventing the wheel or doing something totally out of the norm I'm happy to hear about it. AS3 is by no means my first language. I understand writing software, just not all the intricate details of how AS3 works. I've played with Tweens a bit and plan to use them for transitions and cut scenes but for complicated stuff (like shaking the screen for an earthquake) I just couldn't use them.
There's a simple array for the hero's inventory with no way to manage it. I chose an array over a vector because I don't want to do all the extra gear work of making a generic item base class and extending everything else off of it, it's less prone to break and more simple that way. I will probably change my mind about that and write a base class but that'll be decided later. The eventual goal is to have an inventory screen with currently worn gear, a keyring managed separately from main inventory, and a space for quest items separate from inventory. I want to make a GUI inventory manager with icons that are drag-drop capable, very similar to Diablo II but all items would take up 1 slot. I like the idea of 32x32 pixel icons for inventory items.
Something to Note
I've never seen RPG-Maker or any other game-making software. I'm making things based on my experience with playing games. If there's a feature or function you would expect but don't see I'm happy to take suggestions. I have a short to-do list of features to work out with no particular order. Maybe I should formally write-out that list and post it here so everyone can see it and leave comments.
Had a little bit of time on my hands so I decided to put some more stuff into my engine and game demo. I think I've settled on a solid-ish API for now but still haven't put together a real inventory. I'll post the source on my site in a zip file for anyone curious to see what it looks like so far. I can't promise it'll look nice or even make sense but I try to leave comments and I try to make things meaningful. I'm open to hear all suggestions, comments, etc.
Game demo page now has zipped source file link!
I decided I didn't like how dialogs were displayed and didn't like how I setup event handling to work with them initially. Changed it so the engine can queue up several dialogs to display, one after the next, and added the ability to display an image to the left or the right of the text in the dialog messages. Check it out, they have conversations now!
I'm back from Amsterdam! There's a new update to my demo. Added a dialog function. Give it a try if you like.
@cemkalyoncu
I've been looking at how to do A* path finding in flash for a couple months. It doesn't look so complicated but never having done it means I have no idea. I'd like to make that part of this game engine at some point. For now I think I need to finish implementing NPCs and enemies first.
I'm using Adobe CS 5.5 Flash to build my FLA file and associated AS3 files. If you want I can email what I have made so far to you when I get back to Germany. I'm happy to share with anyone else who's experienced and has some idea what the internals should look like.
@cjc83486
Some nice graphics you linked. I looked through them a little bit. Have to look more when I get back.
Happy 4th of July. I won't have much chance to work on game stuff this weekend because I'll be in Amsterdam, plus it was my anniversary on Tuesday. I did make a good start on NPCs (non-player characters) but there's still a bit left before they're done and troubleshot/tested. Have a good weekend!
I found the same problem when I uploaded some graphics. Someone else mentioned it's a known bug on OGA.
I'm not picky about particular formats. I prefer an image file (PNG, GIF, JPEG, TIFF). I'll take whatever mapeditor uses too (http://www.mapeditor.org/). PDF works as long as it's color and reasonable quality. I have the Adobe CS 5.5 master suite so if someone makes some crazy cool awesome sauce map in Illustrator or Photoshop I can deal with those formats with no problem (just make sure it's compatible with CS 5.5). If you have a friend who wants to make a map using HTML, CSS, and Javascript I'll be fine with looking at that in a browser. I don't really care as long as it's viewable with normal software. I have a virtual machine that runs Ubuntu linux so I can open GIMP formats but I prefer not to do that because it's extra work for me to conver to a flat image format that I can use.
If you want to make an ASCII level in notepad with a legend telling what characters represent what tiles in what LPC files I'd probably be willing to try to use that too. Just don't get too crazy or use weird formats and we'll be okay. I prefer flat image formats that are common industry standard. Whatever makes a small file size that's easy to see detail is prefered so it can be emailed.
Things I Need:
There are some things I'd like to get related to characters. These can come before, during, or after the maps. Stuff I need about characters:
Thing you can do to speed-up the character creation process:
You can sift through my favorites for ideas. I went through and picked out a bunch of the LPC-compatible assets on OGA in preparation for making this game. I've also asked Sharm to make some graphic assets for us at a small cost to myself to personalize this game and any future games I make using my engine.
Pages